USA > Missouri > Scotland County > History of Lewis, Clark, Knox, and Scotland counties, Missouri. From the earliest time to the present, together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and mumerous family records > Part 2
USA > Missouri > Lewis County > History of Lewis, Clark, Knox, and Scotland counties, Missouri. From the earliest time to the present, together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and mumerous family records > Part 2
USA > Missouri > Clark County > History of Lewis, Clark, Knox, and Scotland counties, Missouri. From the earliest time to the present, together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and mumerous family records > Part 2
USA > Missouri > Knox County > History of Lewis, Clark, Knox, and Scotland counties, Missouri. From the earliest time to the present, together with sundry personal, business and professional sketches and mumerous family records > Part 2
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15
STATE OF MISSOURI.
them but would have been glad to give his goods and his life "Por el Rey." The dreamy, sensuous life in the wilderness, among the glorious forests, by the sweet, clear springs and brooks, and on the flowery prairies, was peculiarly suited to the dreamy, sensuous Dons. The little work done by the colonists in their fields was so easily accomplished and so abundant in its results, that it was but pastime to do it.
ERA OF SETTLEMENT.
Gov. Trudeau closed his official career in 1798, and was suc- ceeded by Charles Dehault Delassus de Lusiere, a Frenchman by birth, but a gentleman who had been many years in the service of Spain. His administration, which lasted until the final trans- fer of the country to the United States, was very popular.
Up to the time of the transfer of Louisiana Territory to the United States the Upper Mississippi Valley had been visited by the whites oftener than is generally believed. There were trading posts along the Mississippi as high up as Prairie du Chien. Up the Des Moines, a hundred miles, stood Fort Gelaspy, probably a trading post, and other stations were between that point and the mouth of the river.
Hunters, trappers and explorers visited the country after the year 1800. Prior to that time, but especially during the war of the Revolution, the fear of the Northern Indians kept out all but the most daring. The fierce Sacs and Sioux, animated by a natural love of bloodshed and rapine, and stimulated by British gold, were wont to make frequent incursions upon the Spaniards of Missouri, known as the friends of the Americans and sympa- thizers with, and finally the allies of, the colonists. The Indians often raided the exposed settlements, and murdered the unwary settlers up to 1800, and when they came into the country if they could not find defenseless white men they pounced upon the Osages and Missouris, if there was a favorable opportunity. '
In the spring of 1792 Maturin Bouvet came up from St. Louis, and opened a saline or salt well on Salt River, in Ralls County, at a locality 'afterward known as Muldrow's Lick and Trabue's Lick. Three years later, or in March, 1795, Gov. Tru- deau granted him a tract of land twenty arpens square, which
16
HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.
included the salt well, and soon after gave him a tract of eighty arpens in length on the Bay de Charles on which to erect a ware- house. At this warehouse, from which Bouvet shipped his salt to St. Louis, there was at one time a considerable settlement, that is to say there were three or four cabins and perhaps as many families.
M. Bouvet continued to make salt on Salt River, carry it on horseback to his warehouse, and then ship it by canoes and bat- teaux to St. Louis, until the fall of the year 1799. In the mean- time his establishments had been twice raided and broken up by the Indians. In the spring of the year 1800 the Sac Indians came down again, killed Bouvet, burned his cabins at the Bay Charles, and partially consumed his body in the flames. Only two of his men were with him at this time, but they escaped. These facts were afterward well established by sworn testimony in a suit over the land grants made to Bouvet .*
INDIAN TREATIES.
Although the region now called northeast Missouri had been purchased (of course with much other territory ) from France by the United States, in 1803, yet the Indian occupants of the soil remained to be treated with. Their claim to the land, that of original occupancy, was about as strong as that of France, that of discovery and treaty. France had quit-claimed the country for $15,000,000; now the various Indian tribes were to be set- tled with on the best terms possible.
At the earliest period known, Northeast Missouri was claimed by the Missouri tribe of Indians, called by Father Marquette, the first white man who saw them, the " Ou-Messouret," and by other early French chroniclers the "We-Messouret" nation. They claimed at one time all of the country between the Missouri and Des Moines Rivers.
The first treaty between the United States and the Indians, resulting in the extinguishment of the Indian title to this region, was made at St. Louis, November 3, 1804, between the head chiefs and representatives of the Sacs and Foxes, and William Henry Harrison, governor of the Indiana Territory and of the
*See history of Marion County, p. 130 et seq.
17
STATE OF MISSOURI.
district of Louisiana, superintendent of Indian Affairs of the said Territory and District, and commissioner plenipotentiary of the United States. The chiefs representing the Indians were Layouvois (or Laiyuwa), Pa-she-pa-ho (the "Gigger " or Fish Spearer), Quash-qua-me (the Jumping Fish), Outch-qua-ha (or Sun Fish), and Hash-e-quax-hi-qua (or the Bear).
This treaty was a lengthy one, consisting of twelve articles, in the first of which the United States received the Sac and Fox tribes into friendship and protection, and the tribes agreed to consider themselves " under the protection of the United States and no other power." Article 2 prescribed the general bound- ary line between the United States and the said Indian tribes, as follows:
Beginning at a point on the Missouri river opposite to the mouth of the Gasconade river; thence on a direct course so as to strike the River Jeffreon [Fabius] at a distance of thirty miles from its mouth, and down said Jeffreon to the Mississippi; thence up the Mississippi to the mouth of the Ouisconsing [Wisconsin] river, and up the same to a point which shall be thirty miles in a direct line from the mouth of said river; thence by a direct line to a point where the Fox river, a branch of the Illinois, leaves the small lake called Sakaegan; thence down the Fox river to the Illinois, and down the same to the Mississippi. And the said tribes, for and in consideration of the friendship and protection of the United States, of goods of the value of $2,234.50, which they now deliver, and of the annuity hereinafter stipulated to be paid, do hereby cede and relin- quish to the United States all the lands included within the above described boundary.
The annuity mentioned was to consist of $1,000 worth of goods, "suited to the circumstances of the Indians," to be de- livered yearly to the tribes at St. Louis, or some other convenient point on the Mississippi, $600 worth for the Sacs and $400 worth for the Foxes. It was also stipulated that the tribes should take an equivalent amount of the annuity in domestic animals, implements of husbandry, and other utensils. The tribes agreed to never sell any of their lands to any power but the United States. The other provisions of this treaty are not important to be considered here.
This treaty seems to have been fairly well observed by both parties until the breaking out of the war of 1812, when a large number of the Sacs, nearly all of them in fact, joined the British and fought against the United States. On one occasion a band of Sacs, led by Black Hawk, then a subordinate chief, descended
18
HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.
the Mississippi and killed a number of settlers in Lincoln, St. Charles and Warren Counties. Afterward other bands killed some whites in Montgomery County and in the Boone's Lick settlements. Among the whites killed in Lincoln County at the time of Black Hawk's raid was Mr. Durkee, the father of Chaun- cey and Henry Durkee, afterward the two well known citizens of Lewis County. They were near by when their father was killed, and being mere boys, ran and hid in a hollow log. In the ac- count of his life and adventures, as dictated to Antoine Le Claire, Black Hawk mentions this incident, and says he saw the boys in their hiding place and could have killed them if he had wanted to, "but," says he, "I thought of my own boys at home." It is worthy of note that Quashquame and his band of Sacs were al- ways faithful to the Americans.
After the war of 1812 it became necessary to make another. treaty with the Sacs. This treaty was signed at St. Louis, Sep- tember 13, 1815, by Gov. William Clark, Ninian Edwards and Auguste Chouteau, commissioners of the United States, and cer- tain chiefs and warriors of a branch of the Sacs, designated as " a certain portion of the Sac Nation of Indians residing on the Mis- souri River." This was the loyal portion of the tribe which had separated from the hostiles. Its leading representatives who signed the treaty were the ever faithful Quashquame, Shamaga ( the lance ), Kataka (the sturgeon), Neshota (the twin), Wesaka (the devil), Catchemackeseo (the big eagle), and Chekaqua (he who stands by the tree). This treaty was a re-establishment of that of November 3, 1804. The next day (September 14) a simi- lar treaty was made with the Foxes by the same' commissioners.
Black Hawk and the others of his tribe who had joined the British during the war were at this time on Rock River, in Wis- consin. They were invited to come down and sign the treaty, but were afraid the United States would seize them and punish them for their faithlessness and bloody crimes. They could not be induced to come in and treat until in the spring of 1816, when, on the 13th of May, a treaty was signed between " certain chiefs and warriors of the Sacs of Rock River and adjacent country," and Gov. William Clark, Ninian Edwards and Auguste Chouteau, the latter the commissioners of the United States. This too was
19
STATE OF MISSOURI.
a renewal of the treaty of 1804, and the "Sacs of Rock River " were amnestied and placed upon the same footing they stood before the war. As signed to this treaty Black Hawk's name is translated "Black Sparrow-Hawk."* At this time he was but a sub-chief, by no means a "head chief," and it may be that he was merely a warrior. The other Indians who signed this treaty were Anowart (the speaker), Namawenane (the sturgeon man), Matchequawa (the bad ax), Sakeeto (the thunder that frightens), Cashupwa (the swan whose wings crack as he flies), and sixteen others.
It will be observed that by the terms of the treaty of 1804, the United States acquired the land in this part of Missouri only as far north as the Fabius or "Jeffreon," and only as far west of the Mississippi as thirty miles from the mouth of the Fabius or " Jeffreon." The country north of the Fabius and west of the thirty-mile strip was claimed by the Sacs and Foxes until 1824. But in 1818 the Government surveyed the thirty-mile strip cross- ing the Fabius, and going as far north as the Des Moines River. The land included north of the Fabius was listed, and opened to entry for six years before the Indian title was extinguished. The land now included in Knox and Scotland Counties was not sur- veyed and opened to entry until after 1824.
August 4, 1824, the Sacs and Foxes made the last treaty con- cerning their lands in Missouri. By this treaty they, for a cer- tain consideration, ceded and quit-claimed to the United States all right, title, interest and claim to the lands, " to which the said Sacs and Foxes have a claim," within the limits of the then State of Missouri, lying and being between the Mississippi and Mis- souri Rivers, and between a line running from the Missouri at the mouth of the Kansas River, north one hundred miles to the north- west corner of the State of Missouri, and thence east to the Mississippi. By the same treaty the lands "lying between the Rivers Des Moine and Mississippi, and the section of the above line between the Des Moine and Mississippi," were intended to be for the use of the half-breeds belonging to the Sacs and Foxes. The United States agreed to pay the Sacs and Foxes each $500
*In the treaty the Indian name is spelled " Muc-ke-ta-ma-che-ka-ka," but as commonly printed it is "Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kia." The two spellings differ somewhat, but there is an evident identity in the pronunciation of the word, and both clearly mean the same thing.
ʻ
-
20
HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.
annually for ten years; to pay Maurice Blondeau, a half-breed Fox, $500; to support a blacksmith among the Indians so long as they thought proper, and to furnish said Sac and Fox Nations with farming implements and. cattle. Thereafter no claim was made by the Indians to any part of Missouri, except to the Platte Purchase, which was acquired in September, 1836, from the Sacs, Foxes and Iowas.
PIKE'S EXPEDITION.
Soon after the acquisition of the Louisiana Purchase, in 1803, and the Indian treaty of 1804, previously mentioned, President Jefferson sent out two exploring expeditions to examine into and report upon the general character and resources of the new terri- tory. It will be remembered that there had been strong opposi- tion to the Louisiana purchase for various reasons, one of which was that the price paid, $15,000,000, was excessive. To be able to convince the people of the United States of the satisfactory nature of the bargain that had been made, and to further inform himself in regard to the country, Mr. Jefferson sent Capts. Mer- riwether Lewis, and William Clark up the Missouri River, and Lieut. Zebulon M. Pike up the Upper Mississippi, each with a considerable party. The Lewis and Clark expedition left St. Louis in the spring of 1804, and returned in 1806.
Lieut. Pike left his encampment at St. Louis, at 4 o'clock, P. M., on Friday, August 9, 1805, in a keelboat seventy feet long, with provisions for four months, and with a crew of one sergeant, two corporals, seventeen privates, and an interpreter. The names of the party were Lieut. Z. M. Pike, Sixth Infantry, commander ; Pierre Rosseau, interpreter; sergeant, Henry Kennerman; cor- porals, William E. Meek, Samuel Bradley; and privates, John Boley, Jeremiah Jackson, John Brown, Jacob Carter, Thomas Dougherty, Hugh Menaugh, Alexander Roy, John Sparks, Pat- rick Smith, Freegift Stout, William Gordon, Solomon Huddle- ston, John Mountjoy, Theodore Miller, Peter Branden, David Owings, David Whelply.
As this was the first important American expedition on the Upper Mississippi, it may receive more than passing notice. Lieut. Pike was the first American to publish a description of
21
STATE OF MISSOURI.
what is now Northeast Missouri, and his little book (printed at Philadelphia in 1810) gave to the world the first authentic account of the country along the banks of the upper river. Al- though but twenty-five years of age at the time, Lieut. Pike was of mature mind, and seemed to realize that he was writing for the instruction of generations of his countrymen, who were to come after him. He kept a diary, and carefully transcribed the. incidents of each day's journey, even when they were so trivial and unimportant as the catching of a few fish or the losing of a dog.
On the 15th of August, 1805, Lieut. Pike tells us, he passed Salt River and "left another dog." The next day, at about 3 o'clock in the afternoon, he arrived at the house of a Frenchman, who had an Indian wife, and was living on the west side of the river, about seven miles below the mouth of the Fabius, or near the Bay Charles. Pike describes the location as " opposite to Hurricane Island," and on his map he calls it "the Hurricane settlement." Although this Frenchman lived in what is now Marion County, yet as he seems to have been the first permanent settler in this portion of the country after Maturin Bouvet, it is proper to note what Lieut. Pike says of him. As to his situation at the time, we are told that his cattle were in fine order, but his corn was "in a bad state of cultivation." He was a farmer, therefore, not a trapper. "About one mile above his house, on the west shore," says Pike, "is a very handsome hill, which he informed me is level on the top, with a gradual descent on either side, and a fountain of fine water. This man, likewise, told me, that two men had been killed on the Big Bay, or Three Brothers [ meaning, probably, the Bay Charles and the Two Rivers, although 'Three Brothers' may have been another name for the Bay Charles or 'Big Bay'], and he desired to be informed what measures had been taken [by the United States authorities ] in consequence thereof. We encamped four miles above the house."
The next day the party made thirty-nine miles without special incident, save the passing of three boats or batteaux, probably belonging to trappers or traders. The day following they trav- eled twenty-three miles, and were fired into by some Indians on the Illinois shore. On the 19th an accident to the boat delayed
22
HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.
them so that they made but fourteen miles, and on the 20th, at 7 o'clock in the morning, they arrived at the foot of the "rapids De Moyen," as Pike spelled the name. This was immediately above Keokuk, and hard by on the Iowa side was a considerable Sac village, with Mr. William Ewing, as United States agent, and a French interpreter.
The gallant young officer accomplished much good for his government among the Indians of the Upper Mississippi, though enduring many extreme privations, and encountering extraordi- nary dangers and difficulties. He returned to St. Louis on the 30th of April, 1806, and the following August was sent on another expedition up the Osage River, and into Kansas, Color- ado and New Mexico. On this trip he discovered the noted mountain still bearing his name. The Spaniards made him pris- oner, and escorted him back to his country. He was made a brig- adier-general in the regular army, and was killed during the war of 1812, at the battle of York, in Upper Canada, in 1813. The county of Pike, in this State, was named in his honor. In his report Lieut. Pike gives the following description of the country in this quarter, as he saw it in 1805:
Salt River [the Indian name of this stream was Auhahah, or Oahahah] bears from the Mississippi north 75° west, and is about 100 or. 120 yards wide at its entrance, and when I passed appeared to be perfectly mild, with scarcely any current. About one day's sail up the river there are salt springs, which have been worked for four years; but I am not informed as to their qualities or productions. In this distance the navigation of the Mississippi is very much obstructed by bars and islands; indeed, to such a degree as to render it difficult to find (in many places) the proper channel. The shores are generally a sandy soil, timbered with sugar maple, ash, pecan, locust and black walnut. The east side has generally the preference as to situations for building. From this to the river Jauflione (which is our boundary between the Sac Nation and the United States, on the west side of the Mississippi) we have the hills on the west shore, and low lands on the east, the latter of which are timbered with hickory, oak, ash, maple, pecan, etc .; the former the same, with an increase of oak. The east is a rich sandy soil, and has many very eligible situations for cultivation. About seven miles below the Jauflione a Frenchman is settled on the west shore. He is married to a woman of the Sac Nation, and lives by a lit- tle cultivation in the Indian trade. The river before mentioned is about thirty yards wide at its mouth, and bears from the Mississippi about southwest. In this part of the river the navigation is good. From this to the Wyaconda River the navigation is easy, with very few impediments, and the soil on both sides is pretty good. This river pays its tribute to the Mississippi by a mouth 100 yards wide, and bears from the latter nearly due west. Just below its entrance is a small streanı fifteen yards wide, which discharges itself into the Mississippi.
23
STATE OF MISSOURI.
Between this river and the river de Moyen there is one small river emptying itself into the Mississippi on the west, of about fifty-five yards in width, and bears southwest. The first part of the distance is obstructed by islands, and the river expands itself to a great width, so as to render the navigation extremely difficult ; but the latter part affords more water, and is less difficult. The tim- ber is principally oak and pecan.
The relative positions of the streams in this quarter, as shown on Pike's map, are correctly indicated on the map below:
Des Moines
Fox.
IOW_
LINE
1
River
River
Sac Village
v Jauflion
Wyaconda
Jauflions
1
/ River
S. Jauflion
River
River
MISSISSIPPI
River
1.
Hurricane Settlement
RIVER
River
Salt
The stream called the "Jauflione" by Pike was the Jeffreon, now called the Fabius. It was sometimes called the " Geoffrion," and Dr. Beck was of opinion that the original name was "Jav- elot." It is a French word, signifying a war club, and doubt- less the Indian name was of the same signification. The name Fabius, it is believed, was derived from the Spanish word faba, a pea or bean. The Spaniards probably gave it that designation because of the great number of wild peas originally upon its banks. In time the south fork was called Little Faba; then both streams were spoken of as the Fabbas, and of course the
24
HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.
corruption was easy to Fabius .* Pike evidently did not know that the stream forked a short distance above its mouth, but Dr. Beck, in his Gazetteer of 1823, thus describes it:
Fabba Creek, a small stream of Ralls County, runs a southeast course, and after receiving Little Fabba, empties into the Mississippi in Township 59 north, Range 5 west of the fifth principal meridian.
By the "small river" between the Wyaconda and the Des Moines is doubtless meant Fox River, which was first called Stinking Creek.
At the time of Pike's visit the Sacs, Foxes and Iowas claimed the soil in this quarter, and indeed all of the land from the entrance of the Jauflione, on the west side of the Missis- sippi, up the latter river to the " Des Iowa," above the "Prairie des Chiens " (dog prairie), and westward to the Missouri River. The claim was based upon a treaty between the Sacs and Foxes a year previous, and the Iowas were allied with those tribes and under their special protection.
The Sacs then numbered 700 warriors, 750 women, 1,400 children, and perhaps 200 old men, and possessed 700 firearms. They resided in four principal villages, the first on the west side of the Mississippi, at the head of the Des Moines rapids (near Keokuk), which was composed of thirteen log lodges; the second was on a prairie on the east shore, sixty miles above; the third was on Rock River, in Wisconsin, and the fourth was on the river Iowa. Their principal chiefs were Washione and Pock-qui-ni-ke, alias Bras Casse, or " broken arm." The noted Black Hawk was a Sac, and chief of the tribe during his war, in 1832 .*
The Foxes resided in three towns on the west side of the Upper Mississippi, but hunted on both sides. They numbered 400 warriors, 500 women, 850 children, and had 400 guns. Their head chief was Olopier; under him were Pecit, called by the French Le Petit Corbeau, or " the little crow;" and A-ka-que, known to the French as Le Peau Blanc, or " the white skin."
* In the " History of Marion County," by the present compiler, it is stated on page 771 that the Fabius was named by Don Antonio Soulard, the Spanish surveyor, in honor of Fabius Maximus, the great Roman general. With more light on the subject than he had in 1884, the writer is now of opinion that the name came as stated above, and that the real English name of the stream is Bean Creek.
* Black Hawk often visited this section, which was called the Two River country from the North and South Rivers in Marion County. In his autobiography, dictated in 1833 to Antoine Le Claire, he mentions it frequently, saying "it was our best hunting ground," etc.
25
STATE OF MISSOURI.
The Iowas occupied two villages, one on the Des Moines and the other on the Iowa River. They had 300 warriors, and all told numbered about 1,500 souls.
These three tribes continued to claim this country until their treaty with the United States after the war of 1812, and contin- ued to visit it at intervals until their final expulsion and removal to Kansas, in 1844.
FIRST SETTLEMENTS.
In 1803 Missouri Territory underwent an important change. The Indian summer of Spanish possession and occupation had been succeeded by the brief but stormy winter of French domina- tion, and now there followed the balmy and bustling spring and summer of American rule. From 1804 to 1812 French voyageurs and chasseurs and American hunters and trappers passed up and down the Mississippi above St. Louis, sometimes paddling and poling their way in canoes and batteaux, and sometimes tramping overland. A few actual settlers came up into what is now Pike and Lincoln Counties during this period.
But the war of 1812 forced the American settlers to seek shelter at a block-house or fort, and drove every trapper and hunter back to his headquarters. British Indians were on the war path, and controlled the country, and he who ventured into it carried his life in his hand. But immediately after the close of the war, in 1815, adventurous pioneers began to push up into the beautiful country above Louisiana, or " Campbell's Post," in Pike. In 1817 Giles Thompson crossed Salt River and built a cabin at Freemore's Lick.
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